"Life" drawing in and around Galway

As someone who has lived in Galway City, Ireland for over 5 years and loves to draw, I thought it would be nice to make a list of the places I like to go to draw. I am hoping it will be useful for visiting artists or local artists looking for some new spots to be inspired by.
I like to draw that which lives, people, animals, plants and trees and drawing from life is good practise. Of course drawing people, plants and trees can be found all over so I am dedicating this post to good spots for drawing animals.

1. The zoology corridor, NUIG Galway.
Located on the university campus and free to visit, this is a great place to draw a variety of animals from "life". I use the word life loosely because all the animals here are dead and subjected to taxidermia. This is great for those less accustomed with life drawing as the animals clearly never move a muscle but you can still observe them from different angles, something you do not get with drawing from a single photo. There's a great variety of animals to choose from and I can spend hours there. The only disadvantage is that they are only open 9.30AM-5PM Mon-Fri so if you are otherwise occupied during office hours, you don't get much opportunity to go there.

2. Galway Atlantaquaria, National Aquarium of Ireland.
Overlooking the popular Galway Promenade in Salthill, the aquarium is a fantastic place to draw fish from life. The aquariums inside are filled with local sealife like fish, rays and sharks as well as some less local beings, including piranha fish. There are a good few chairs and benches to sit down with a sketchbook and the landscaping in the aquariums makes for a lovely complete picture to draw. It is not free but take a look at the website for the admission fees and membership deal.

3. The Burren Birds of Prey Centre.
Not in Galway but about an 50 minute drive away in the neighbouring county Clare, this is a wonderful place to visit with the purpose of drawing the animals. They are a zoo/sanctuary specifically for birds of prey, such as owls, hawks, falcons and eagles. These animals don't waste engery on needless moving around so while not sitting as still as my deceased friends at the university, you still get plenty of opportunity to capture a pose.

Another place worthy of note is the Natural History Museum in Dublin, this place is like the zoology corridor but bigger. It's a little eerie but I love it there.

Ireland also has a variety of zoos that are worth looking up but I have no experience drawing in them. I hope this short list is useful for people who love to portray animals that find themselves in the West of Ireland at any point.

Healing Time

I have not been well for the last few...I would like to say days but weeks or even months would probably be more honest. Ever since co-hosting a disappointing Halloween party I have been in a downwards spiral that has really started getting to me in the last few weeks. It's silly, life is good and I have much to be grateful for. But my mind drifts towards the negative side of almost anything and everything. I find reasons not to do something in the blink of an eye.
Right now the core of my concern is to do with a job and because I know what the Internet is like I will say nothing more on this.
Today started out poorly as usual but it got slightly better. What really gets me in a funk is not knowing where I stand and being too proud to figure it out. Today I decided to try out a bellydance class, booked an osteopathy and reiki treatment (the latter fascinated me and if the treatment is amazing, I would like to do a Reiki 1 Course) and accepted that doing Krav Maga right now is not the best idea for me. So I made some decisions which is never easy for me but it feels great when it's done.
Also, my diet was vegetarian today and I just realised that makes for another succesful meat-free Monday!
Creatively I did a lot of work on the OOAK Art Doll I am making, the first of what will hopefully be many. I also ordered some fabric to make a skirt so hopefully my overlocker will finally see some use and I look forward to putting some creations up here.
Today has made me aware that the biggest problem with my moods is the lack of motivation that comes with it. Once I am doing something, keeping busy, I start feeling better immediately.

Something to remember...

What am I eating?

I am unemployed at the moment so my husband and I try to be as frugal as possible without sacrificing our principles. We refuse to eat meat (or animal products like eggs) that has been raised in the terrible conditions of the intensive farming industry. Now living in Ireland, we have come to understand that the conditions of cows in this country are quite good so we feel fairly comfortable eating beef. Because of our financial condition we have bought packs of frozen beef burgers at Lidl the last two weeks, and we supplement this with fish and vegetarian meals. But yesterday it has come to light that in a lot of the burgers in a variety of Irish supermarkets including Lidl traces of horse and pig have been discovered.

I guess I have been naive to think that it would be safe to eat cheap burgers. Ignoring the warnings about processed meats for the sake of money was downright stupid. Reading this has only strengthened my resolve to increase my vegetarian intake and supplement this with occasional meat and poultry from actually reputable sources like the meat stall at the local market. Learn more here.

Knowing what you eat is important!

Meat-Free Monday Moussaka...MMM!

I decided to honour Meat-Free Monday and make a Moussaka type dish with what I had in the house.

I sliced half an aubergine and soaked the slices in olive oil with salt, pepper and garlic. Meanwhile I made a sauce with a 400gr tin of peeled plum tomatoes, fried mushrooms and boiled red lentils.

I seasoned it with salt, pepper, garlic, cumin and chili powder. I let this simmer for about 20 minutes for some of the juices to evaporate. Then I took the aubergine out of the bowl I was soaking them in and transferred the sauce mixture into said bowl.

I layered the frying pan with aubergine, put a layer of sauce on top and repeated that. On top of all of this I sprinkled grated mozzarella mixed with nutmeg. I put a lid on the pan and let it stand on medium heat until all the mozzarella was melted (see the lower photo). 

It's not pretty, I am not great at pretty cooking but it was delicious and I have a portion leftover in the freezer because it's very filling. 

The week that's in it.

Woo and Hoo, my favourite shows are back this week after the break! It's not that I have nothing better to do, far from it. I am, however, an incorrigible procrastinator and catching up with tele is as good a reason as any to not do anything more productive.

Here are the shows I follow:
Elementary: I did not want to like it but I do. I just see it as more of a cop show than a Sherlock interpretation. They were back from break early and the show it getting pretty exciting!

Revenge: To be completely honest, this has started to tank a bit in their second season. But the conspiracies have me hooked anyway, it's one of those things. They have been back on as well.

Castle: Again one that is back on already (this post made sense before I started writing, I swear). Now that Castle and Beckett are an item, I was afraid the show would lose some element of tension but I don't find that to be the case. In fact after the last episode I would even say there is more tension.

How I Met Your Mother: Though not as good as it once was, I have grown attached to Ted and the gang. I am not sure how much longer they can keep it going though.

Supernatural: I will always love the Winchesters, they just hit me where I live! And now that Castiel is back, so much the better!

Arrow: I got into this through my husband. Again, full of conspiracies so you keep on watching.

Archer: The new season starts this week!!! I am excited about this one. The first ever episode is still my favourite but all the people at ISIS just crack me up and Baboo, always Baboo!

Once Upon A Time: I love this. I have only started watching recently on Netflix so I am not up to date on it.

Nikita: I started watching Season 1. Then I think it got delayed and I didn't watch it for ages. Now hubby and I are into Season 2. It really picked up in the second half of the first season!

Game of Thrones: Not starting until March but that'll be along sooner than I think! I. Can. Not. Wait!

I drift in and out of Glee and Californication depending on how bored I am.

I also enjoy Grimm (for Monroe) and Community but their delays kind of threw me off the track.

So there you have it, my pathetically long list of shows (and I didn't even include Downton Abbey!).

The Cliffs of Moher

I am taking this opportunity to put a face to the name. The hubby and I went out hiking at the beautiful Cliffs Of Moher yesterday and as usual I took a few photos.

Grumpy Phoenix

I am just taking some time to re upload stuff from my Tumblr as my blogs with photos did not exactly come through the best. Here's an oil painting I did of a phoenix recently. Taking photos of oil painting is hard!

Deserting Tumblr for Blogger

I just created this additional Blogspot page to separate my  more random posts from my portfolio blog. So far I have been using Tumblr for this but commenting on blogs doesn't always seem an option with them and I expect to find a slightly more mature crowd here.

I am passionate about animals and have recently started on the road to a cruelty free lifestyle in terms of what I eat and cosmetics so a lot of my posts will probably be about that. My other interests include art (mainly illustration), literature, film and TV, hiking and other outdoor pursuits, spirituality and a lot of other stuff that does not immediately come to mind. So this blog will probably be a bit of a mashup ranging from shouting principles from my imaginary soapbox to downright geeky fangirling but I will try to keep it as coherent and well written as possible with plenty of pics, or it didn't happen.

I would welcome some tips on the following:
- Who to follow on here with similar interests what I mention up here.
- Good video instructions on how to pimp your blogspot, as coding and anything of that nature is very far from my thing.

Now to see if this works to import my Tumblr posts to this blog. Good luck to me!

Eating Out at Creole

For our 5 year anniversary Mr. Dutchess and I went to a grill place called Creole in our hometown of Galway, Ireland.  We had an absolutely gorgeous meal. But vegetarian it was not and at that time my cruelty free consciousness was not yet spreading as far as eating out. That has changed but I would still really love to go back to this restaurant. So when they put up their specials last night, I left a comment asking about where they source their meat, particularly their chicken and pork as cows and sheep are most often free range in Ireland.

Here’s their reply:

@Linda. Pork from collerans. Chicken usually from the friendly farmer. But he’s off for two weeks. Back to free range then. In six months Dan the chef will hopefully have the first of his own free range saddleback pigs for the restaurant. Lots of bbq pork then. 

I am reasonably impressed by their answer. The Friendly Farmer I know to be reputable and cruelty free in its animal rearing. Shame they’re not looking for free range alternatives while he isn’t working but to be fair, he is not exactly one of many. I am not familiar with Collerans, a quick Google search does not tell me much about their policies on cruelty free meat but they do seem to have a good name around here. The fact that the chef rears his down pigs at least inspires the notion that he is conscious of the issues surrounding meat rearing.

For now I am way too broke to go out to eat anywhere but hopefully by the time the chef’s pigs are all set I will be back in a job.

The Transition Phase

Due to my transition to the cruelty free lifestyle I am still in the posession of a (fortunately) limited amount of cosmetics that is not cruelty free. I have been asking myself what to do with this. So far I have been throwing out some of the older stuff but I have been hanging on to some of it too. Having already spent the money I feel I may as well although I am sometimes reluctant to use it. I welcome any thoughts on this.

Another transition is the one of companies to used to be cruelty free but give it up. Would you hang on to the products you already bought or would you chuck it all out straightaway?

Then there are the companies like The Body Shop and Urban Decay. Cruelty free in their own right but also owned by decidedly cruel L’Oreal. I am very conflicted about this. One the one hand they now slot money indirectly into animal testers’ hands, on the other they are now more widely distributed, giving more people the chance of discovering the cruelty free lifestyle (the latter being PETA’s stance). I still have some products by both brands, which I intend to use up. I will not buy any additional products from them for now until what I have is used up and will make my final decision then.

I welcome thoughts on all of the above!

Going full time cruelty free.

In the last few months of 2012 I started living with an increased awareness of how our consuming styles affect those living creatures that cannot defend themselves against humankind but feel pain and fear just as we do: the animals. This was always something I had in the back of my head and I have been buying freerange eggs and chicken and largely non animal tested cosmetics for a long time. However, my principles were often still overruled by convenience, finances, cravings and whatever else “stood in the way”. But enough is enough and it is time to stand by my principles. And these are that animals should not have to needlessly suffer to serve our purpose.

This does not mean that I will become a vegan or even a vegetarian. I do not see a problem with eating meat, eggs and dairy or using other animal products such as leather and wool, as long as the animal it came from was raised in an ethical way and is not threatened to be extinct. Animals kill and eat other animals and to me the only difference between us and them is that we can feel guilt and can think beyond our need to feed. I believe eating and using animal products is part of our nature, we have done it for many years. Where we have gone wrong is the intensively farming of animals for this purpose; causing pain, fear and disease among those we should protect.

So this is my principle and I will stand by it by reducing my consumption of meat and only sourcing it on rare occasions from local farms of which I know the animals were well treated. The same goes for any other animal products and cosmetics: I make a special point of not buying anything as frivolous as an eyeshadow when the products or ingredients were cruelly tested on lab animals.

I want to continue this blog by sharing my musings and some of the products I end up buying as part of the cruelty free lifestyle and where I source them from. I hope this will benefit some people and inspire them to keep in mind our animal friends when spending their money.

One of my major examples when it comes to food awareness is Hugh Fearnley Whittingstall. I very much share his opinions and have recently bought and cooked from his River Cottage Veg! book. It has wonderful recipes that I can recommend to vegetarians and meat eaters alike.